Republicans have forgotten how to control spending
Q: Have Republicans forgotten how to control spending?
A: Absolutely. We let spending lurch completely out of control. As president of the United States,
I'd take an old veto pen that Ronald Reagan gave me, and I'd veto every single pork barrel bill that comes across my desk. And we've got to stop it and stop it now. I look forward to it.
Source: 2007 GOP YouTube debate in St. Petersburg, Florida
Nov 28, 2007
AdWatch: Outrageous to spend $233M for bridge to nowhere
[McCain ad, "Outrageous," which began running Nov. 12]
ANNOUNCER: $233 million for a bridge to nowhere. Outrageous. $3 million to study the DNA of bears in Montana. Unbelievable. A million dollars for a Woodstock museum in a bill sponsored by Hillary
Clinton. Predictable. Who has the guts to stand up to wasteful government spending? One man, John McCain.
McCAIN: I'll stop wasteful spending by Congress and restore Americans' trust in their government. I'm John McCain and I approve this message.
Source: FactCheck.org: AdWatch of 2007 campaign ad, "Outrageous"
Nov 20, 2007
FactCheck:Bridge-to-Nowhere never built; would serve 200,000
McCain's TV ad cites "$233 million for a bridge to nowhere," calling the cost "outrageous." Funding for the "bridge to nowhere," also known as the Gravina Island bridge in Alaska, was tacked on to a 2005 transportation bill.
Whether it was truly
a "bridge to nowhere" is debatable: Gravina Island, while it has almost no permanent population, is also home to the Ketchikan International Airport, which processes about 200,000 passengers a year.
Alaskan officials hoped that the bridge would simplify airport access and allow development on Gravina. The bridge was not the only or the most expensive project attached to the transportation bill, and it may not have been the most frivolous.
But it became a symbol for government pork.
In light of the furor over the "bridge to nowhere," Alaska's governor opted to use the money for other pursuits. The bridge was never built, but McCain has been using it as his prime pork example since 2005.
Source: FactCheck.org: AdWatch of 2007 campaign ad, "Outrageous"
Nov 20, 2007
FactCheck: Criticized "Woodstock museum," but skipped vote
One earmark McCain highlights in his TV ad is $1 million for a Woodstock museum, which, he mentions not-so-subtly, was proposed by Sen. Hillary Clinton, the leading Democratic presidential contender. The earmark would have allotted $1 million to
New York state's Bethel Woods Center for the Arts, future site of a museum celebrating the 1969 Woodstock music festival and its effect on American culture.
But McCain wasn't present for the vote on an amendment he co-sponsored to remove the stipulated
funding for the museum and reroute about a third of it to maternal and child health services. He was out on the campaign trail.
It's true, as the McCain campaign points out, that McCain's vote would not have changed the outcome.
Still, we wonder whether voters might have a different view of McCain's ridiculing of the museum not just in this ad but in two others, as well as a presidential debate, if they knew of his absence for the key votes.
Source: FactCheck.org: AdWatch of 2007 campaign ad, "Outrageous"
Nov 20, 2007
Congress spends money like a drunken sailor
We lost the election in 2006 because we lost our way. We began to value principle over power, and spending got out of control. Spending lurched completely out of control. Ronald Reagan used to say, we spend money like a drunken sailor.
I never knew a sailor, drunk or sober, with the imagination of the Congress. I received an e-mail recently from a guy who said, "As a former drunken sailor, I resent being compared to members of Congress."
Source: 2007 GOP primary debate, at Reagan library, hosted by MSNBC
May 3, 2007
Veto all pork-barrel bills and announce pork spenders
Q: How will you be different, in any way, from Pres. Bush?
A: I would have vetoed spending bill after spending bill after pork-barrel project after pork-barrel project, in the tradition of President Reagan. The first pork-barrel bill that crosses my
desk, I'm going to veto it and make the authors of those pork-barrel items famous all over America. We're going to stop it.
Q: What specific programs would you cut if you were president?
A: Line-item veto is the best tool. We need it very badly.
Source: 2007 GOP primary debate, at Reagan library, hosted by MSNBC
May 3, 2007
Use veto power to reduce government spending
McCAIN [to Bush]: You seem to depict the role of the president as a hapless bystander. [Clinton] is threatening to shut down the government and vetoing bills to force the congress to
spend more money. An active president, i.e. me, will veto bills and threaten to shut down the government to make them spend less money.
Bush: It’s the president’s job to make sure Congress
doesn’t have the money to spend in the first place. It is the president’s job to stand up to express the will of the people, advocate and
fight for a meaningful real tax cut. And that’s what I’m going to do.
Source: (X-ref to Bush) GOP Debate in Manchester NH
Jan 26, 2000
Distribute surplus: 23% tax cuts; 62% Social Security
McCain says he would dedicate just 23% of [the federal budget surplus] to a tax-cutting plan. For the rest of the surplus, McCain says 62% would bolster Social Security, 10% would go to Medicare, and 5% would pay down the
national debt. “John McCain has never voted for a tax increase, but he thinks saving Social Security is the issue,” McCain’s campaign manager said.
Source: Associated Press, in The Enterprise (Brockton MA), p. A9
Jan 4, 2000
$9B of pork in current budget bills; cut subsidies
McCain said he has found at least “$9 billion worth of pork and wasteful spending” in the appropriations bills now being considered by Congress that could fill the budget gaps. He specified subsidies for oil, ethanol and sugar as examples. “Congress has
found the funds to raise their own salaries but they can’t find enough to help and lower and middle-income Americans,” said McCain.
Source: Will Lester, AP/LA Times
Oct 1, 1999
For Balanced Budget Amend., & off-budget Social Security
McCain was one of only two Republicans who voted twice, in 1995 and again in 1997, to take Social Security “off-budget” - removing it from balanced budget calculations as part of a constitutional balanced budget amendment - which would have prevented the
government from filling the trust fund with “IOU’s”.
Voted YES on $40B in reduced federal overall spending.
Vote to pass a bill that reduces federal spending by $40 billion over five years by decreasing the amount of funds spent on Medicaid, Medicare, agriculture, employee pensions, conservation, and student loans. The bill also provides a down-payment toward hurricane recovery and reconstruction costs.
Reference: Work, Marriage, and Family Promotion Reconciliation Act;
Bill S. 1932
; vote number 2005-363
on Dec 21, 2005
Voted NO on prioritizing national debt reduction below tax cuts.
Vote to table [kill] an amendment that would increase the amount of the budget that would be used to reduce the national debt by $75 billion over 5 year. The debt reduction would be offset by reducing the tax cut in the budget framework from $150 billion
Approval of the 1998 GOP Budget which would cut spending and taxes.
Status: CR Agreed to Y)78; N)22
Reference: H. Con. Res. 84 as amended;
Bill H. Con. Res. 84
; vote number 1997-92
on May 23, 1997
Voted YES on Balanced-budget constitutional amendment.
Approval of the balanced-budget constitutional amendment.
Status: Joint Resolution Defeated Y)66; N)34
Reference: S. J. Res. 1;
Bill S. J. Res. 1
; vote number 1997-24
on Mar 4, 1997
Maintain & enforce existing spending caps in the future.
McCain adopted the Republican Main Street Partnership issue stance:
What we offer today are not the precise spending decisions of a given year's budget; rather, we call upon the Congress and the nation to adopt the following guidelines for our fiscal policy over the next decade. This long-term blueprint is essential for maintaining both the immediate public-sector goal of balancing the budget and the private-sector goal of a healthy economy. This can be achieved through the following steps:
A commitment to maintaining and enforcing existing spending caps in the future, when such discipline becomes more difficult to achieve;
A careful and considerate re-definition of the federal role in society (what should be the legitimate and proper role of the federal government in the twenty-first century, and how do we prioritize competing demands?); and
An evaluation of implementing tax cuts based on their social fairness.
Source: Republican Main St. Partnership Issue Paper: Fiscal Policy 98-RMSP5 on Sep 9, 1998
